Lost Cause
by Cobalt Cat
Summary: Pre-G1 A Decepticon battle cruiser is stranded in space. The crew must pu up with each other and find a way to escape the deathtrap their ship has become...


Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers. I own all the characters in this except Morbid. Morbid is the avatar of "Morbid Child of the Family" on FictionPress.com. She is used with permission.  
  
A cruiser floated silently, in the vacuum. It was a large sucker; big, black, and oval to boot. There weren't any lights on, on the hull. That meant that either there wasn't any power in the ship or the lights were off to save power. And either way, the crew wasn't happy. Not one bit. That might have been because their long range scanners were out.  
  
Shard, a short black and tan femme, sat and glared. Very, very hard at the computer bank before her. Maybe she did it because she was mad at it or because she was mad at herself for not being able to fix it. Either was good; but to everyone who knew her, it was more likely that she wanted to make the thing work by willing it. However, she seemed more likely to fry it... and she probably had. Because she was a computer technician with limited power over electricity.  
  
Then Shard seemed to loose whatever small amount of sanity she had left from this 'weird venture' (the whole crew called it that). She stood up and started trying to... fight the computer bank, as well as trying to insult it. And, well, insulting an inanimate object is frustrating, especially, when they don't respond.  
  
"You slagging computer, you've been mocking me since I joined this nutty crew."  
  
And, then, she seemed to have a mental breakdown because she shoved her chair away from her, backed toward a dark corner. When she reached the corner, she was all but invisible, only the tan parts of her body were visible. Then, when her back was against the wall, she slowly sat down, ignoring the sparks she created when her back scraped against it... and began trying to suck her thumb. Very hard to accomplish when you don't have a mouth.  
  
Snap sighed, Shard was the tenth one to crack under the pressure. She'd been good at what she'd done, if lazy, 'till the engines and long- range scanners had broken down. Pit, they'd ALL been good at what they'd done 'till then. The first to go had been the captain, tattoo. He was just a gibbering wreck, now. And the others weren't much better. Well, he would know, he was the ship psychiatrist.  
  
He shook his head and got up, "Come one, Shard, let's get you to a nice padded room."  
  
Shard snarled at him, her optics flashing dangerously, then she bolted and vanished down an annoying dark corridor. He sighed, slagging power!  
  
Then his com beeped. He heaved a long-suffering sigh and answered. Why was he being called, anyway? He'd asked that no one call him! Whatever it was it had better be important, or someone would be getting an adio full of complaints.  
  
"What is it," he barked, "I was busy!" Technically that was a lie, but he had been busy a minute ago.  
  
A pause, then...  
  
"Um, Snap, Deja'vu's, well, snapped." Was all the femmes' voice said. The femme sounded like his idea of a stereotypical, mad scientist. It was Cobalt, the chemist, then. And she was laughing, now. Fabulous.  
  
He hadn't moved since Shard left, but he started walking, "Cobalt, shut up, how did slagging Deja'vu snap, and leave off the puns!"  
  
Another voice answered him.  
  
"Feh, neither of us knows how, when, or why she cracked." That voice was low pitched, and feminine, but not breathy in the least. That was Morbid, then.  
  
Morbid was the ship coroner. She also very sarcastic. She and Cobalt were friends, though it was a rather dysfunctional relationship.  
  
"Where are you?!" Snap snapped, and stopped walking, at least until told him where they were.  
Cobalt answered his question; however, she had to shout over a din that had arisen. "The Beta Four engine room. And you'd better get Blaze, hurry, 'cause I don't think Morbid can hold her for long!"  
  
However, Snap hadn't heard the rest of her message, because he'd turned his com off and started running for the engine bay. He knew how strong Deja'vu was...  
  
Cobalt blinked, flashed her optics, and grinned maniacally at the room in general. Morbid glowered at it, Cobalt had spray painted it pink. Then, Morbid grumbled, in a puzzled sort of way, "Why pink? Couldn't you have used black, orange, or red? I actually like those colors."  
  
"Of course I could, but then I wouldn't have the pleasure of annoying you, or anyone else, for that matter."  
  
A grumpy glare was all Morbid gave her, she only grinned wider in response. They were in the command room.  
  
They walked outside, neither of them interested nor wary of the sounds that bounced oddly in the corridors. Frankly, they'd heard them to many times. No-o-o, they were wary of silence. Silence meant there was something wrong. That and explosions meant things were wrong.  
  
"Let's go and get Blaze, then go to a rec-room and top-up."  
  
"Sounds like a plan, Cobalt, but why do we need to bring Blaze? You know I don't like him."  
  
"Blaze needs to energize, too" Cobalt giggled, for no good reason.  
  
They'd walked through several corridors before they heard maniacal laughter. This wasn't uncommon nowadays, because at least nine of their crewmates had cracked under the stress. However, most of the laughter normally came from Morbid, Cobalt, or Sapphire (a femme about as sane as either of the former). And when Cobalt laughed, she screamed. Which had scared the scrap out of everyone, when they had first heard her. And neither Cobalt nor Morbid had any problems with this. The laughter seemed to be coming from the Beta Four engine bays. The only being who might be there was Deja'vu, the engineer.  
  
"Cobalt, It might be good to make a detour, to see about Deja."  
  
"'K."  
  
They switched direction and headed, unsurprisingly, toward the engine bays. And, the laughter got louder as they got closer, very unsurprising.  
  
"Maybe," Cobalt sounded nervous, "we should have gotten Blaze, Deja's stronger than either of us, he'd be able to hold her down."  
  
"Possibly, it's the only thing he's good for, in my mind."  
  
"I don't like this, let's just go back and get Blaze." Cobalt sounded even more nervous than she had before.  
  
Morbid grinned, daredevil risks were her department. She ran a finger from her optic band, down her cheek. "Tear. To bad, so sad."  
  
She didn't sound sympathetic; the opposite in fact, was true.  
  
Cobalt gave her a withering glare, she had mood swings often and muttered something involving revenge, super glue, and pink paint.  
  
Then, they heard a snarl and Shard rounded the corner. She had a wild animalistic look to her. If she'd been a squishy, she would have foamed at the mouth ... If she'd had a mouth, that is.  
  
They stood there, they stared. Shard snarled, nothing. She growled, still no reaction. She stared at them, currently rather confused. Finally, she got a reaction. Cobalt pointed and laughed at her. The laugher/screams startled her. She crouched, she snarled, she seemed about to try and scratch them. Cobalt laughed louder, she looked like she was about to fall down.  
  
Morbid looked at Cobalt, then at the ceiling as if asking why she was stuck with her. Then Shard turned and bolted back the way she came.  
  
Morbid looked at Cobalt in exasperation, the other was leaning against the wall to stand and vents opened on her body to cool down her rapidly over heating systems.  
  
The sounds were louder now, and because Morbid was beginning to twitch (gee, Cobalt must be getting to her), she grabbed Cobalt and dragged her along behind her. With the increase in pace, they reached the engine bay within a matter of minutes.  
  
Deja'vu was currently turning an engine panel apart. Well, so much for repairing them. Cobalt took one look at the situation, panicked, and called Snap. It took a few seconds before he answered.  
  
"What is it?" Gees, he sounded harassed... Great! She could harass him more later. He continued, "I was busy!"  
  
She glared at her com for a nano-second, then. "Um, Snap, Deja'vu's, well, snapped."  
  
She looked up as Deja pulled a paint can from subspace and dumped it over a monitor. And began to cackle. Maniacally.  
  
He was snarling now, "Cobalt, shut up, how did slagging Deja'vu snap, and leave off the puns!"  
  
Morbid had tensed up when they'd entered, but she answered Snap, "Feh, neither of us knows how, when, or why she cracked."  
  
The coroners cannon turret had swiveled until it rested over her hips, it tipped forward until it pointed toward Deja'vu. Then She leaped forward, trying to tackle Deja. It didn't work, but she did grab Deja's arm.  
  
Then, "Where are you?!" Snap, snapped.  
  
Things began to get very loud just then, as Morbid and Deja'vu were having a fistfight.  
  
She yelled in answer, "The Beta Four engine room. And you'd better get Blaze, hurry 'cause I don't think Morbid can hold her for long."  
  
Cobalt sighed, they obviously weren't going to have Blaze's help. The psychiatrist had switched off his com before that part.  
  
Then she turned her attention to the problem at hand. Morbid was trying to beat Deja's head in. it wasn't really working, because Deja had her in a headlock. Well, helping wouldn't do any harm. Cobalt brought her acid gun from subspace, and began trying to draw a bead.  
  
Blaze sat, and stared. At the center of his attention was a wall. The wall of his room.  
  
He was a feline-like robot, without an altmode. A mane of spines with assorted venom's framed his head. He stared at the wall; if he'd been on Earth some eight- million years in the future, he might have said it looked like a kaleidoscope.... If he'd known what a kaleidoscope was, that is.  
  
Two hours later:  
  
He was still staring at the wall. There had been several noises; including maniacal laughter. Then, he heard someone running down the corridor outside his quarters.  
  
He puzzled over it for about two seconds, then got up and followed the footsteps (and forgetting he had a door).  
  
He caught up with the footsteps when they stopped in the doorway of the Beta four engine bay. He ran right into them. The footsteps turned out to be Snap, and no one in their right mind bothered him.  
  
Blaze hurriedly scrambled off the psychiatrist and backed away from him. Then he turned his attention on the events in the engine room.  
  
Cobalt was hiding behind a computer bank, her gun was on the other side of the room. She was clutching one of her arms and looking spooked. She was also missing part of her paintjob.  
  
Morbid currently was in a computer bank and unconscious. Apparently, she'd tried to take Deja'vu on, and lost multi-colored sparks danced on a shoulder where she was missing armor plating and treads.  
  
Snap was aiming his gun at Deja and trembling in fury. He snarled at Deja, fired, and missed. That was one angry psychiatrist. And Blaze, not being the sharpest tool in the shed, seeing all this, surmised that they were playing in a free-style combat simulation. With this in mind, he charged in and body-slammed Deja.  
  
Deja had been about to smash a crowbar into an engine (yup, she got that far) when Blaze landed on her. And what with the addition in weight and the abuse it had received lately. The floor broke. Blaze leaped away; but Deja'vu fell, hitting a several large gears on the way down, and was impaled on a broken pipe. Blaze had made it to unbroken floor. He stared down at Deja and remarked, "She not fight."  
  
This was about as intelligent as his comments usually got, unsurprisingly, as on the intelligence scale, he had a one. The others all disagreed with him on his point, however.  
  
Morbid groaned as she sat up. "Deja did a number on me, didn't she." It wasn't a question.  
  
"Yeah, she knocked you out and thew you into the computer bank... after she beat you up, got me, too." Cobalt's reply didn't explain much.  
  
"Snap, you think you can repair us."  
  
Cobalt had come out from behind her 'shield.' She walked over and helped Morbid get out of the computer bank. Once Morbid was standing, she went and retrieved her gun.  
  
Morbid made faces at Blaze. Blaze made faces back, to his limited ability. Snap had gone over to inspect the damages of the two.  
  
"Of course, I can, but let's go to the repair bay." He sounded miffed.  
  
Elsewhere; Shard, Tattoo and all the other crewmates that had cracked under the stress, were planning.... Stuff. 


End file.
